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Sunday, October 22, 2006

Retail therapy....

I'm sick of not reading. Actually, I read all the time, but I've neglected fun reading in favor of work. What a waste, yes? Tonight I finished a book for class that was nothing short of shocking, sickening, but in the end quite affecting: Push, by Sapphire. It's about a girl who's sexually abused by her father AND mother, not to mention a barrage of other horrors. Just when things seem like they can't get worse...OH they do. Elise and I went out to lunch at a fabulous dive of a Mexican food restaurant today, and after stuffing ourselves with seafood (catfish, shrimp quesadillas, ceviche, more shrimp...a platter for 2) we decided to go to Half-Price Books and see what we could dig up. Like we don't each have 2.2 zillion unread books as it is. At Half-Price I picked up Hand to Mouth, a memoir by Paul Auster;Saturday, by Ian McEwan, half of which I read a year or more ago; and Selected Poems of Anne Sexton. I've loved Sexton's Transformations for years, but I thought it time to dive into more of her confessional train wrecks.After Half-Price Elise and I were feeling a little (a lot) let down by their recently downsized fiction section, so we rounded the corner to Starbucks (pumpkin spice latte for me, white chocolate mocha for her) before we popped by Barnes & Noble for more book browsing. I bought my mom a "bake your own dog bones" kit and for me:The Shawl, by Cynthia Ozick (at Elise's recommendation)The New York Trilogy, by Paul Auster in one easy-to-tote volumeSince I'm done with Push I think I'll start The New York Trilogy. Upon a first look, it doesn't look like something I'd go for, but I trust that anyone married to Siri Hustvedt, and with Auster's reputation, is going to titilate me with his words.Listening: Charlie's Angels on TNT

Funny you say that, I have both Oracle Night and Book of Illusions on my constantly growing pile of books. If I don't care for the trilogy I'll definitely push Book of Illusions up. I also started his memoir, Hand to Mouth. Very good so far.